


Burning Embers

by Watashi_wa_Okami



Series: Oneshots no one asked for [5]
Category: Gintama
Genre: Angry Sensei, Angry Shouyou, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Canon Compliant, Family Loss, Fire, Heavy Angst, Hurt No Comfort, No Dialogue, Pre-Canon, Pre-Joui War, Sad Gintoki, Shoka Sonjuku, Sorry Not Sorry, Spoilers, They need a hug, but not really, hagi - Freeform, questionable comfort, they failed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-21
Updated: 2020-09-21
Packaged: 2021-03-08 03:20:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,125
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26578984
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Watashi_wa_Okami/pseuds/Watashi_wa_Okami
Summary: Takasugi had never seen Gintoki helpless. Katsura had never seen Gintoki insecure. Neither had seen Gintoki weak.Then the fire happened.(how did it come to this?)
Relationships: Katsura Kotarou & Sakata Gintoki, Katsura Kotarou & Takasugi Shinsuke, Katsura Kotarou & Yoshida Shouyou, Sakata Gintoki & Takasugi Shinsuke, Sakata Gintoki & Yoshida Shouyou, Takasugi Shinsuke & Yoshida Shouyou
Series: Oneshots no one asked for [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1516460
Comments: 3
Kudos: 102





	Burning Embers

**Author's Note:**

> My take on what happened that fateful day, from Katsura and Takasugi's perspectives.

Takasugi had never seen Gintoki helpless. Katsura had never seen Gintoki insecure. Neither had seen Gintoki weak. Not their first year with Sensei, definitely not the second (he became comfortable, energetic, and Sensei was slowly showering the boy in _sweets_.) Years passed in a blur, and yet Gintoki stayed the same.

They traveled and fought, but always Gintoki was by Shouyou’s side, and always with his sword (they had asked Shouyou about it immediately. Gintoki was too wild to have a sword, his eyes too dead, _What if he hurts someone?_ They once heard an old classmate ask Sensei. They never heard the response. As the years passed, they couldn't imagine Gintoki without a sword at his side and the thought became more comforting than anything else.)

Then the fire happened.

Gintoki had been acting anxious for some time, and Shouyou since even before that. They were jittery, eyes never staying in one place for too long. Sensei hid it behind the smiles, through words of reassurance and the lull of teaching. Gintoki hid it in long glances to the woods, beginning fights with Takasugi or passing on the chance to ‘beat the midget.’ Both done in uncharacteristic circumstances, not that they'd ever called him out on it.

When the fire happened, Takasugi nor Katsura were really surprised. The village they were nearby was only a little less hostile than the others. And it really took some place special for both Sensei _and_ Gintoki to agree on it. In other villages, Katsura had noticed how the people treated Gintoki, how he couldn’t really be trusted to go someplace by himself, not without the fear of the people thinking him a _demon_.

Shouyou would _never_ choose any of those villages, he never elaborated why it angered him so. But it was only ever the soft, quiet sort of anger, missable if one doesn’t spot it’s first and only sign. Maybe a twitch of a brow or the slight opening of one eye (or _both_ , that’s when he’s _really_ angry.) Both Takasugi and Katsura would miss it but they learned that Gintoki _never_ did. He was a hawk. When Sensei got angry, Gintoki’s energy would hum and pulsate, sharp, dull red eyes gleaming in a new and frightening way.

But that was only when Sensei got upset. And that hardly ever happened. The first time they knew he was angry, it was only because, for once, they weren’t as angry as him. Gintoki didn’t know they were there at first. He had been looking at a food cart from a distance. He had just gone through a quiet period (quiet in his terms. Takasugi nor Katsura had noticed any before this one, but Shouyou always would,) and he hadn’t really eaten food for a while. He had gone into town on his own, probably to scout the place out and nothing more.

The food cart owner ignored Gintoki at first. He was serving the two people at his stand over-enthusiastically, but his sharp eyes would flick to Gintoki enough that the permed idiot noticed. And so, Gintoki being Gintoki, he walked right up to the stand, pinky in nose and face unwavering. Takasugi never understood how that dead fish stare could be seen as anything other than moronic, and yet the villagers never failed to compare him to a demon.

He hardly had the chance to speak. The cart owner was sharp and quick; he didn’t care about what the child had to say.

“Don’t you curse my stand.” The words were hissed, sharp and the threat was clear: _You’re not welcome here_. Takasugi and Katsura were too startled to be immediately angry. Shouyou, however, had an ear that could process words heard too often.

Gintoki didn’t have the chance to respond, he immediately lit in high energy as he felt Shouyou’s eyes open, he felt the anger - the killing intent, held back yet so strong - even if it only lasted for milliseconds. The two young spectators took only a moment, and being right next to Shouyou, they felt his true anger for the first time. It almost made the air warm around him. They watched Gintoki’s response and for the first time recognized that it was not his reaction to the food cart owner.

After the seconds of an exchange, Shouyou walked up, all smiles yet oozing an energy that promised pain. And as he placed his hand on Gintoki’s head, the food cart owner would (always) freeze and numbly apologize after Shouyou’s passive command.

Then they would walk away, all nearby carts and spectators staring with mouths wide open.

Later that night, Katsura and Takasugi would retell it, confused on how they had never truly noticed Shouyou's rage or how truly impassive Gintoki was to thrown insults.

But, as they noticed, there were many times the food carts would be rude to Gintoki _not_ in Shouyou’s presence. They mostly happened when Shouyou was stuck preparing food for all the students and he would typically send Gintoki ingredient hunting, something Katsura and Takasugi sometimes ~~followed~~ joined him on.

Those times, the remarks were less severe. Gintoki would shrug it off and offer some deadpan remark about how he bets they don’t even have any sweets, _what a waste of time_. Takasugi always noticed, though, how those pale knuckles would bleach until his hands, so small and pudgy, would pop with veins and knuckles and crack as though wishing for a reason to draw.

Katsura always watched Gintoki’s face, expecting _something_ more. He never found it.

Gintoki never drew the sword. And the movements were so minuscule they couldn’t be noticed behind that deadpan façade. So, as far as the shops were concerned, the brat truly _was_ a demon, straight through the icy heart.

Yet Hagi was different.

* * *

Takasugi had never seen Gintoki helpless, Katsura had never seen Gintoki insecure. Neither had seen him weak. Not until the fire.

The children all slept in Shoka Sonjuku, and when the first one felt the warmth flicking their face, they shouted all the others awake. Screaming and dragging their friends behind them, they ran through the small building. The flames howled in their ears and singed the only set of clothes they owned. Beams creaked above them as the fires expanded, but they were soon out the back with little more than scratches and second degree burns.

Through the pain, they dragged themselves to the nearby wood and down a muddy slope. They tended to their blisters, biting their lips and holding back tears as they tried and failed at controlling shaky hands.

They needed an adult - they needed _Shouyou_.

Takasugi and Katsura were the least hurt. They were quick to wake after the first, and they pulled the others to their feet and out the door, weaving through the fire with more ease than the rest.

Katsura had even managed to save his hair.

So the two boys left. They peaked over the mud to see their home still burning, slow, as if the shrine itself refused to fall. As if Shoka Sonjuku refused to fall.

Then half the building collapsed. Smoke and dust flew out in a plume, the fire burst out before waning, and through the broken beams and the dying fire they saw little more than the blurry traces of the Naraku.

* * *

_Gintoki and Shouyou awoke to the smell of flames and smoke. It had hardly begun, but they were near the entrance. Gintoki ran out first, eyes searching for the threat._

_They were stronger._

_Shouyou told him to leave, get the kids and_ leave _. Gintoki refused - the next thing he knew, there were staffs on his throat and tears burning behind his eyes as Shouyou accepted the fate he didn’t deserve._

_“protect them for me”_

* * *

They were quick to run around, the flames too high for them to do much else, and they cursed the added time.

They didn’t forget about Sensei and Gintoki. Those two are ridiculously strong and a fire would be nothing to them. At least, it hadn’t been in the past. Sensei probably dealt with the guys in a heartbeat. Or Gintoki did. They couldn’t be caught off guard.

That’s what was supposed to happen.

Instead, Takasugi saw Gintoki helpless. Wrists tied behind his back, shoulder pressed painfully to the ground. His face was shadowed by hair and matted with ash. It looked painful, but he wasn’t complaining.

They wished he would, though. They wished he would complain to the heavens and moan about the burnt sweets and his lost bed.

Takasugi reached him first, eyes looking for the sword Gintoki fought with - because Gintoki’s strong and he’s beaten Takasugi more times than he could count - because Gintoki _always_ had a sword.

Takasugi didn’t find the sword, not a wooden practice one. Not Shouyou’s sword.

Instead, Katsura came up in time for Takasugi to sit Gintoki on his knees, and Gintoki’s eyes were open but unseeing. His chest heaved but there was nothing inside. He was helpless, a feeling Takasugi had felt often with his father and the first time he faced Gintoki. Takasugi watches those restricted pupils _quiver,_ he watched Gintoki’s lips not tremble but rather have nothing at all, no sign of life outside of the emptiness that was once his heart.

_Where’s Sensei?_

_This wasn’t supposed to happen_.

And so, Katsura saw Gintoki insecure. His eyes too wide to not have tears, and yet there were none. Instead, he had nothing in him as Takasugi frantically spoke to him, volume fluctuating the longer Gintoki said nothing.

Then his lip quivered and he gasped into life. His eyes doing everything but landing on his closest friends. He couldn’t form the words, he could do nothing but fight back the tears, and he succeeded in that, but only that.

He then numbly nodded his head as Takasugi asked, over and over like a mantra, where Shouyou was, if he was coming back, if he was alright.

The nodding meant nothing, they both knew that. They couldn’t see Sensei and the only thing that would put Gintoki - strong and unbendable - on his knees, arms tied behind his back, was if he had been struggling. Long and hard: he’s covered in injuries, purple blooming on his throat in a pattern that worries Katsura. He’s scratched and singed, blood smeared across his face and arms, and those red eyes are almost brown.

Then he finally speaks, his tongue almost flops out the words, his head far away from them.

Never had either of them seen him so weak, not until that day. When they untied him, he was limp in their arms. He would hardly lift his head, _could_ hardly lift his head if the sudden limpness of his form was anything to go by. But his shoulders didn’t shake. He just sat like a puppet without strings - because Shouyou was his strings.

They had never seen Gintoki so lifeless. It was as if he had nothing in the first place (they aren’t immediately drawn to all their conversations with Shouyou but eventually they recall riddled whispers about a battlefield and a blade Gintoki had stained over time.)

It was odd, picking Gintoki up and wiping the dirt off. He was numb the whole time, eyes unevenly blinking, gaze unfocused and lips trembling. All the while, he didn’t cry. He'd never let them care for him before, even after nightmares. And for all the times they'd practically begged him to lean on them, they find it more unnerving than comforting. Find themselves feeling a hollow helplessness as they stare at those empty eyes.

Then they saw the other students. Their dirty tear-stained faces, throats hoarse and yet they still manage to groan and harshly gasp in pain. Gintoki immediately stood to walk on his own. It shook Takasugi and Katsura; Gintoki was so frighteningly dead and just then he was acting like his old self. Or, a corpse of it. He showed his teeth and he picked his nose, but his eyes stayed in that murky, ugly brown and his voice lacked any support. It almost broke in the wind, but the others didn’t notice it.

And Gintoki took a breath before explaining how to deal with the blisters. He was always doing that, coaching the kids through their issues, only the obscure ones - finding edible plants while they traveled, telling them how to stay away from the war using the crows, and aiding them in all manner of injuries - so they don’t doubt him for a second. It stings and they cry, but he assures them that _it’ll be fine_. Takasugi and Katsura immediately jumped in to help.

They vowed to never see Gintoki in such a state again.

(they failed)


End file.
